Stephanie Paulsell
Fear of flying: Shared vulnerability
I recently flew with my family from Tel Aviv to Boston via Rome. The day was full of long lines, bomb-sniffing dogs, the opening and searching of overfull suitcases and the struggles to close them up again. In Rome, every single person on our flight was patted down and searched. We must have shown our passports 20 times.Impromptu debates arose as people from all over the world waited in line together. Was it better to search for the explosive device, as the Americans do, or for the bomber, as the Israelis do? Do the airlines need better technology or better training in behavioral screening? Has the war on terror made us more safe or less?
Kept awake by love: The prophetic voices of Advent
In spite of my best intentions, somewhere around Halloween my ability to stay on top of things begins to unravel....
Old-fashioned love song
Song of Songs is a forgotten book, hidden away between pragmatic Ecclesiastes and monumental Isaiah, but if you look, you’ll find it, shining with summer’s golden light.
Reading reverie: A child lost in a book
After a week of chilly, rainy weather, a bright sunny day finally arrived here in New England. Not too hot, not too cool: it was, as Goldilocks found the baby bear’s porridge to be, just right.
...Torturous times: The need for a Gamaliel
Human beings give way too easily to the temptation to make our arguments on each other's bodies. The apostles' lives were saved because one learned man was willing the make his argument another way.
A saint for hard times: Saint Hedwig
I’ve been wondering who would be a good patron saint for the deepening recession in which we find ourselves....
Gathering up the fragments: Pieces of possibility
“I am looking for a way to vocalize, perform, act out, address the commonly felt crises of my time,” Terry Tempest Williams writes in her new book, Finding Beauty in a Broken World (Pantheon...
Good news: The vision Jesus offers
It’s the day after the election, and I am clicking around on one of the many interactive maps of the nation available on the Internet....
Out of darkness: Images that reach us
My husband and I found the WorldWide Telescope a few months ago, and we’ve been staring into the heavens ever since. “Which planet would you like to see first?” he asked me once he'd loaded the program onto his computer. No question: Saturn. I’ve always been fascinated by those rings. A few clicks of the mouse and there they were, circling and circling, a sash of light, a halo, a crown. We looked at Jupiter next, with its great red spot. We looked at Mercury, Venus, Mars and Pluto. Each planet was unique, different from every other. But what they had in common was this: they shone out of utter darkness.
Choosing a seminary: Learned ministry is about all of us
In American theological education, we are in the midst of recruitment season. Applications to M.Div....
Stories to live by: The fantasy worlds of Pullman and Lewis
The release of the film version of Philip Pullman’s novel The Golden Compass has reinvigorated the controversy over his trilogy, His Dark Materials....
Where we come from: A common heritage
Several summers ago, I visited the early medieval monastic site of Glendalough with students and faculty from a seminary in Dublin. The site dates back to the sixth century, when St....
A small, beautiful thing: Making a difference; changing the world
Years ago, when I had just begun teaching and wondered what kind of contribution I might make to the great world of scholarship, I spoke with a teacher and scholar whose work I very much admired....
Body language
In baptism, we are not only bathed but also clothed. “As many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ,” writes Paul in his Letter to the Galatians....
Gospel ventures: Learning from new forms of church
Mainline to the Future: Congregations for the 21st Century, by Jackson W. Carroll ...
Fearfully and wonderfully made: Reflections on cosmetic surgery
Making the Body Beautiful: A Cultural History of Aesthetic Surgery, by Sander Gilman
...Reclaiming a peculiar faith
Three senior pastors of large mainline churches describe, in the words of one, their "ascent out of liberalism." They offer fragmentary glimpses of how a postliberal church, exiled from cultural pr...